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Thursday, March 29, 2007

Divorce, Yankee Style

A daughter of Yankees owner George Steinbrenner filed for divorce this week, from husband Steve Swindal, a Yankees general partner and chairman of Yankee Global Enterprices, LLC. Swindal was Steinbrenner's hand-picked successor, in line to one day run the most successful franchise in sports history. Jennifer Swindal filed the papers Tuesday, citing "irreconcilable differences."

On February 15 Swindal was arrested in St Petersburg FL and charged with driving under the influence, a misdemeanor. Was this the straw that broke the camel's back for Jennifer Swindal? I don't know and it's none of my business. However, what I think is my business, as a baseball fan, is how this will impact the way things are run in the Yankee front office.

The Boss issued this statement yesterday: "I'm the Boss. I continue to be the boss. I have no intention of retiring and my family runs the Yankees with me." Buster Olney made another appearance on ESPN's "Mike & Mike In The Morning" today and let everyone know that Swindal has been a major influencing factor, convincing The Boss to jump onto the Youth Movement Bandwagon and not trade away prospects, advocating for more power for GM Brian Cashman and helping Joe Torre keep is job at the end of last season. Now that Swindal will be out of the picture, "all bets are off," Olney says. If the Yankees are falling out of the race in May or June, Torre might lose his job, all the young prospects may get traded away (good news for the rest of the teams in MLB) and Brian Cashman might eventually end up running the Phillies. All of this could happen thisyear? I doubt it. Olney should give the Yankees more credit than that. If this team learned anything from its last dynasty, it's that a dynasty is more likely when homegrown talent is moved through the system and those who manage that system are left alone.